[toulcit]

Hello people,

So it has already been two weeks back, since I recorded a classical concert.
It was all very sudden and things had to move fast. On monday teh week before I came in contact with a guy who was participating in the same annual local festival as I, the Mijzen festival. So we have been discussing before about the possibility to record a classical concert. And this time it got mentioned again, but his concert was already on friday the next week. So I took the challenge and first had to find out how I was going to approach this. First what kind of micing technique did I had to use? I read upon several on this forum, there were a lot of people saying I should just use to mics. ah well. Then I had to decide which gear I should use.

I read on the forums that clean pre's were the way to go, to get the classical sound, so I thought to myself hmm I have a Yamaha 01v96 and a warm Yamaha pm1000 preamp, and I thought..well this sure isn't the way to go. Of course the yamaha pre's are pretty clean, but not of a pristine quality I was looking for.

I don't know how it is in America, but here in Holland there are no rental companies that I know of which would rent you studio preamps, and I looked around.

So I remembered one time I posted a thread on this forum about trading my yamaha for a x-desk, a nice guy called Michiel Hollanders from Joystick Audio offered me to try the X-desk. While I wasn't sure about the switch then I still had that offer in mind. I got ssl 5000 modules (preamps, line amps eq's) but they needed to be racked, and I was curious for the ssl sound.

But since I needed clean preamps I thought of the offer and was thinking about a mynx with 2 ssl superanalogue preamps. So I figured what the hack, I could at least ask if I could try them for a demo. So I mailed Michiel, and to my suprise he agreed and said I could try them out.
So I asked him, so what's it going to cost me and what are the terms?
He said it doesn't cost you anything as long as you don't break them.
I was suprised to here that.

Ok then I had to take care of the mics, so I got in contact with a local guy, and he wanted to loan me 2 Neumann km184 mics.
So I thought hey that is settled then.... So I thought.
On thursday he called me back, and said he forgot to tell me he was doing a show on friday ( the day of the concert). So I thought.. hmm now what. I only had a sm58 at home, which we all know isn't suited for that application.

So I told this story to Michiel, and he immidiately had an answer, the Josephons c42. I searched on the forum about this mic, and people had good reviews on the mic. And said it was a good replacement for the neumann's. So he also send the josephons mics my way to try out. So I was very happy.

So that's he short introduction :D.

So I took the stuff to the church where the concert was at:

A pc running Ubuntu Linux and Ardour Daw with a RME 9652 card.
A Yamaha 01V96
A Mynx with the SSL superanalogue preamps
2 Josephons C42's
2 mic stands
Mogami/ Canare cabling

I looked up micing techniques, and while I read about the ortf method, I choose to use the NOB methode, not only because I'm dutch, but it seemed like a good and easy method to use. :D

So I placed the mics aprox. 30 cm's from each other in a 90 degrees angle on aprox 4 metres high.

Those were plugged into the SSL's and the SSL's were plugged into the Yamaha mixer bypassing the preamp section by inserting them into the inserts.

I just used the preamps, no filters whatsoever, because it was my first classical recording and didn't want to cut things away I couldn't undo later.

Mixdown:

First I listened back the recordings, and they sounded great to start with, very clean and pristine but a little bit boomy.

I read on the forums that with mixing classical music the best way is to use small proportions of eq, dynamics etc.
So I tried to do that, I said tried... So I eq a lot and put a mixbus compressor on the mix and reverb, but I found out soon enough that what I was doing was way to much, and was bringing the dynamics of the music down.
So I unplugged the mixbus, reset the eq. And started all over again.
The mix was a little bit boomy, so I used a low cut at about 100 hz -3 db. Just to make things clearer and used about + 4,5 db on 14 khz and +3 on the mid high 4,5 Khz for presence and +3 on the low mid 280 hz to give it more punch.

Then I used a standard Yamaha Cathedral reverb on the mix not too much.

And on the mixbus I used another eq, EQ1 btw because the EQ2 is maybe more musical but brought less clarity to the mix, the EQ1 sounded better for this purpose. Ah well on the mixbus I used the eq very simple, hpf at 28 hz to -3.4 db, L-mid 425 hz to 1,3 db and h-mid 1.7 khz to +3.4 db and high shelf 4 khz to + 4 db.

Then I bounced it, cut the recording into tracks and here are some of the results.

And I would like to specially thank Joystick Audio and of course Michiel Hollanders for making this possible! Great service, they saved the day!

I will post pics next weeks, since I have to get them from the photographer.

So if you have the chance to try out these preamps, or the Josephsons, please do. But the preamps and mics are on my " things still to buy list".